Christmas 2011

I can't believe Christmas 2011 has come and gone.  We crammed a lot of fun into a few short days!  Here is a glimpse of what our week looked like.

 Our annual Christmas lights and Krispy Kreme trip.

 Lots of vacation time for Scott which means mornings spent by the Christmas tree drinking coffee and relaxing.  You can tell by the color of my coffee how much of a creamer drinker I am!

 A total of 4 batches of Christmas cutout cookies...came and went!

 A great night with the Yoder side at the Farmstead Inn in Shipshewana.  

Even made time for a few family pictures.

 Annual Bingo game

 Reis pretending like he's excited to have won a Webkins

 Lots of swimming in the hotel pool

 Fake responses for mom with the new camera

 Baby Brogan enjoying Reis' new headphones

 Fun times with cousins

Couple of days with the Craiger side down at the Farm playing games, eating, talking, and of course...butchering a pig!

Birthday boy!

 Happy Birthday to me...Happy Birthday to me...Happy Birthday to me...Happy Birthday to me!

Its always a challenge for us in trying to make Davis' birthday feel special.  December 29th he turned 6. We went out to eat as a family.  We asked him what he wanted for his birthday and he couldn't think of anything.  So we offered him money.  He's deciding what to do with his cash.  He is richer than me at this point.  Which isn't hard!  Here are some pics I took last night as we sang to him with his cake ball.

Singing to himself...

 Being silly...

Davis is such a blessing to our family.  He makes us laugh and most of all reminds of what a 

child like faith in Christ looks like.  We really can't believe his 6.  He can no longer use one hand to tell us how old he is.  Time has flown!

Check this out!

I'm just so excited and...well frankly, my family is tired of me showing them what I'm learning:)!  My camera has a color effect setting that will bring out any color that is in the frame.  Below is the color red.

 Above is the color blue and below...gold.

This is my good friend Sarah and her daughter Reagan and her soon to be here... baby.  Love the pink lips:)

Experimenting

Well, I got my new camera.  I have been busy snapping pictures.  Some good...some not so good.  I realize its going to take me a while to get the hang of it.  There are so many options and at times I feel overwhelmed. For those of you who do this as a hobby or more, I'm sure its nothing to you.  But for me who has always owned a point n shoot...its a lot!  Here are some of my decent pics.  

 This one of Owen was taken across the room.  Love the zoom~

 This was also taken while sitting on the couch and I zoomed in on an ornament.

Below is Davis posing.  I've asked them so many times to pose so I can practice taking pictures of people.  They have been good sports for the most part.

 Above is taken in Sepia.

 Love this taken while the sun was setting.  Although I cant remember what setting I had it in!  Aahhh~!

Yay for Organization!

My father-in-law is retired and is very gifted in carpentry.  He recently asked what he could be working on for possible gifts for my birthday and/or Christmas.  Of course I had lots of ideas.  I gave him a picture I had found in a magazine of what I had in mind for our recent addition, hallway/mudroom.  Here has been our constant dilemma...shoes.  Each person has at least 2 pair of shoes.  Multiply that by 7...we have 28 shoes (14 pairs) needing a home.  Coats...don't even get me started.  Last winter was a nightmare.  Kids don't take the time to hang coats on a hanger and our hall tree could only take so much:)

So....Here is what he made me.  It's not quite finished yet but so close.  I had the idea to take the old door that came off the bedroom upstairs and cut it into 4 pieces and make 4 benches.  My father-in-law then made these shelves for me to display some of the boys' artwork over the years.  We now have 22 hooks and 4 benches to hide shoes under.  So far its working out great.  I plan to put end pieces on each side and paint the wall white to make it look like a 'built in'.  But for now, we are happy to have hooks!

37

It was my birthday last Thursday.  We spent the day home doing some projects.  It was also Scott's day off so that was extra special.  The sun was out which I took as a little gift from the Lord!  Scott and the boys made a small cake for us to eat. Both Hudson and Reis had home basketball games that night so I enjoyed going to those as a family.  Every week Scott sends out a journal entry to our church family.  He is very gifted in writing and everyone enjoys hearing from him.  He's doing a series on prayer and I loved how transparent he was in this entry.  I thought I'd share it with you.

This week was my wife’s birthday.  As birthdays go, it’s a meaningful part to give a person you are close to a gift to express to them that you appreciate their life.  Gift giving has never been a strength of mine (not a love language so to speak).  My wife on the other hand loves to give gifts and be creative in what she gives.  Her view is that the giving and receiving of that gift is an expression of care and love.  As you can immediately notice, this has been one of those shall we say…”tension points” in our marriage over the years.  I have had to learn the importance of this to her and she has had to learn to understand it just doesn’t come natural for me.  The primary point of learning for me is to LISTEN for those subtle hints she gives along the way of things that she would enjoy receiving.  I’ve had my share of blunders in this over the years (like the sweater that got returned and the jewelry that doesn’t get worn much…no bitterness here…just reality).  In listening, I’ve learned my wife is very very practical.  She doesn’t like spending money on things that won’t get used or won’t be around for a long time (therefore, things like flowers don’t get purchased very often).  I’ve had to fine tune my listening skills over the years (16.5 years to be exact!)

So, what’s the point in sharing this with you? The point is that it is similar to our  prayer life.  Because I love my wife I want my gifts to her to mean a great deal.  I’ve had to listen in order to accomplish this.  Likewise, each person that prays I believe would say, “I want my prayers to count” or “I want my prayers to work”.  Otherwise you wouldn’t pray.  If you find yourself with that desire in your heart, I submit to you that the best place to turn is God’s Word and learn to listen for what God desires us to pray.

(P.S. – To avoid answering all your questions on Sunday, yes, I did a good job of giving a gift this week.  She had to get it herself but it was exactly what she wanted and it will be used !!)

He and the boys surprised me last week and told me that they voted unanimously that they'd like to get me a nice camera.  ( I guess my hints worked:) I had been talking with a friend about buying her camera that she no longer uses, but didn't feel like it was a good time to spend the money on myself with Christmas coming.  I am very excited to get my gift...its on its way!